The ManicaPost
Donald Kamba Makoni
SANCTIONS are variously defined as authorisations, permissions, approvals, consents, endorsements.
Zimbabwe has been under an economic embargo also known as sanctions for almost two decades now. Who endorsed the sanctions?
Zimbabwe is an independent state recognised by the world body called the United Nations that either endorses or rejects actions intended to punish a country deemed to be erring in respect of values and principles that guide the operations of the United Nations Charter.
Permanent members of the Security Council of the United Nations wield veto powers that seek to oppose any proposals or intended actions deemed unfair and unwarranted.
Indeed economic sanctions mulled by western nations, notably Britain and its allies against Zimbabwe for alleged violation of human rights, the rule of law and property rights, among others, were vetoed by Russia and China.
The veto meant that Zimbabwe would not be punished by any member of the United Nations.
Zimbabwe got punished in 2001 through a multiplicity of measures under so-called Zimbabwe Development and Recovery Act (Zidera), with the American Presidential Executive Order making it next to impossible for the southern African nation to secure credit lines, balance of payment support and foreign direct investment, effectively decimating the economic life of a country that was supposed to have been spared the gallows by Russia and China.
To the extent that Zimbabwe is under sanctions without the endorsement of the United Nations it does mean that the sanctions are not only illegal, but, indeed a declaration of war upon an entire nation.
To the extent that Zimbabwe is operating under illegal, unjustified and unfair punitive measures, its economic performance is drastically impaired.
Everything put on balance, Zimbabwe needed to devise innovative measures to confront this uncomfortable and untenable position.
Has Zimbabwe done enough to cushion itself from the vagaries of inimical action taken unilaterally against it?
The call by SADC to have the sanctions removed unconditionally and the formal lodging of such a position on October 25, 2019 indicates in unequivocal terms that the embargo is hurting not only Zimbabwe but also the region and by extension the whole continent of Africa.
The debilitating effects of economic sanctions anywhere in the world are well known, and it would be disingenuous on anyone’s part to pretend that sanctions are harmless to the economy.
Unfortunately for Zimbabwe, sanctions and corruption have become the Siamese twins, too inseparable as become the double dose of trouble that is nothing short of a curse upon the nation.
And current efforts by the Anti-Corruption Commission to unravel cases of corruption are commendable to the extent that the nation awaits convictions and sentences commensurate with the alleged crimes.
The call for the lifting of sanctions is noble and indeed necessary, noting that they are illegal, unjust and vindictive in so far as they seek to condemn the Zimbabwe land reclamation program and justify racially induced disproportionate distribution of national resources.
Sanctions must go because they kill in as indiscriminate a manner as a silent war that is even worse than an open war.
Zimbabweans must take radical action against sanctions and some of its citizens that appear to have embraced corruption as a fashionable pursuit.
The question as to whether sanctions or corruption are to blame should never arise because both are evil and both must go if Zimbabwe should hope for better times ahead.
Will Zimbabwe prosper in the absence of sanctions while engulfed in corrupt activities that know no boundary and that go unpunished?
Zimbabwe finds itself at the crossroads, with incredible fund of good will in a new era awaiting exploitation with the highest sense of responsibility.
The challenge lies in the exercise of political will of a nature that has no qualms biting the bullet.
The resolve to stamp out corruption resides in outcomes that also speak of eradicating not only corruption but also the permeation of an insidious culture that calls bad good, and good bad.
China resolved way back in 1979 to move at its own pace despite the cry for political and economic reforms as agitated by the west.
China remains a one party state with its own economic blue print and has become a tower in shaping global affairs because it operates in accordance with the dictates of its own history and its own peculiar circumstances.
China believes wholly in its own culture of hard and honest work with zero tolerance to corruption.
Does Zimbabwe have a discernible culture upon which to claim dignity as an independent and free state or is totally lost in its quest to be global at the expense of national imperatives?
For as long as we think we are our own creators and our own ancestors, we will continue to rely on outside intervention on matters that are the rightful province for Zimbabweans to provide sustainable solutions.
Zimbabweans must go back to their roots in search of solutions that lie in a past built on Hunhu/Ubuntu that has since been forgotten.
It must not be glossed over that Rhodesian whites were extremely patriotic in a stolen land, and advanced the interests of the whites as well as ensured that basic goods and services were also available to the blacks at affordable and reasonable cost.
It must not be forgotten that at independence we inherited one of the strongest currencies in the world, at par with the British pound sterling and twice as strong as the American dollar.
It must not be forgotten that the Rhodesian regime was under legal sanctions that they busted to their advantage.
Given that background, sanctions cease to be an issue if Zimbabweans under black leadership are just as patriotic in the land of their ancestors.
How the most educated nation on the continent even lost their currency in favour of a basket of foreign currencies must worry anyone about who these educated people are.
It is established that at independence, only one person in the civil service, namely David Smith, had a degree, and, the rest did not, and yet it was a highly efficient civil service that ensured that all the wheels of the economy were fully oiled.
Fast forward.
Today, Zimbabwe boasts of the most educated cabinet and the most educated civil service, pregnant with degrees of sorts, that has failed to do what people without degrees could do.
For as long as we shun our indigenous belief and knowledge systems that are backed by our ancestral genes we can kiss good bye to development and industrialisation of a sustainable nature.
Sanctions imposed on a people who do not know who they are and are in fact not interested in themselves but others will do havoc to the socio-economic and socio-political landscape.
Ask the Chinese or any other developed nation, and, if they are honest, they will endorse the above sentiments as on point.
Without a culture that respects history and traditions we perish in the borrowed robes that denote an education over which we have neither power nor authority to command the present and the future.
